In 2000 (after 8 years of Clinton), out of $1 trillion in federal income tax receipts, about $448 billion was paid by those making $200,000 or more.

In 2008 (after 8 years of Bush), out of $1.08 trillion in federal income tax receipts, about $532 billion was paid by those making $200,000 or more.

Note that the top 3-4% are paying half of all federal income taxes here, and they paid slightly more in 2008 than they did in 2000.

The very rich are paying even more. In 1986, the top 1% of earners (usually those making around $1 million or more) paid about 25% of federal income taxes. In 1996, it was 32%. In 2000, it was 37%. In 2007, it was 40%.

In the last reported year, the top 1% were responsible for paying 40% of the income taxes. Whereas the bottom 50% paid less than 3%.

And I'm not even getting into estate taxes, gift taxes, and other taxes that hit the very rich hard but exempt everyone else.

Zute wrote:Wealthy people used to pay a lot more in taxes in the US than they presently do. The Republicans have been kind to the rich.

No they did not.

Prove it.

They may have had higher tax rates back in the 60s and 70s. But they had much much bigger tax loopholes.
Everyone, including the rich, paid less taxes in the past, than they presently do.
We all pay more taxes now than in the past.

Last edited by Fyyr on Sat Nov 06, 2010 8:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Born in Thetford, in the English county of Norfolk, Paine emigrated to the British American colonies in 1774 in time to participate in the American Revolution. His principal contributions were the powerful, widely read pamphlet Common Sense (1776), advocating colonial America's independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain, and The American Crisis (1776–1783), a pro-revolutionary pamphlet series. His writing of "Common Sense" was so influential in spurring on the Revolutionary War that John Adams said, "Without the pen of the author of 'Common Sense,' the sword or Washington would have been raised in vain.”

Wasn't pretty much everyone in colonial America before 1776, a Brit, regardless of where they were born?

Paine was different than most of the others of his time.
He is not considered a founding father of this country.
Yet his ideas were foundational to those who are considered as such.
He was found guilty of sedition in abstentia by the King of England at the time, I don't know any other founding father who was.
He was almost equally responsible for instigating revolution in both America and France, at the time.
I don't know any other founding father, who was as detached from America itself, as he was.
He did not sign the Declaration of Independence. Or the Constitution.
He held no political office in America.

I agree with Adams wholeheartedly.
But I still consider Adams and Washington Americans, and Paine a Brit. And a hero of mine. Call him what you like, I am sure he considered himself British.

[/quote="Tudamorf]
You don't know what you're talking about. Wealthy people pay a fortune in taxes.

And if you invest in non-taxable sources (like municipal bonds), you get a much lower return. That's not a "loophole", it's a federally created municipal subsidy.

Your high standard of living, which you no doubt take for granted, is almost entirely paid for by wealthy people.[/quote]

I didn't say they didn't pay a fortune in taxes. I said they don't pay the same % of their net income in taxes. They pay lower. People get caught up in the fact that they pay "X" amount of money. And that "X" is very large compared to what they make (They = lower/middle class) so they think they are spending all this money on taxes. When the truth is they are paying a lower % compared to those making less moeny. Thats why when politicians always go quoting what a person pays in taxes they never say the % of what they pay but what they payed. If they compared %'s they would lose the argument.

Rich people don't invest in non-taxable bonds, well any signifigant amount at least. The return is too low. They do invest in other funds that are more risky but have a better return. And the bonus of these investments are that if they fail, its a tax write off. If they succeed, they don't pay any tax on the return investment until they withdraw the money. The trick (and loophole) is withdrawing them in a manner that you don't have to pay taxes on them when you finally withdraw the money. It requires intimate knowledge of tax codes but the deductions to get this money tax free exists. It just requires losing money on something (buisness expense that you would normally lose money on) you would do normally in order to offset the investment you made. An easy example that even lower/middle class Americans would understand is dry cleaning/gasoline/vehicle maintanance you can write off if you own your own buisness. They just do it on a much bigger scale than what I stated. They use the loss they would normally incur as a price of doing buisness so they don't pay the taxes on the withdrawing of their investments.

I actually make 40k as a family. Yes, its higher than some but I would hardly call it a high standard of living. And my standard of living is paid for by tax payers because I work for the people(school aid and wife is a teacher). When I worked in the private sector, the people who paid me were not wealthy. They were my (our) customers. The money that paid my checks didn't come out of the owners pockets. Yes, it was money the owner made but the people who bought our products made approx. the amount I made (barely over min. wage) according to accounting/HR. So they money they recieved was recycled money they paid to us in the first place. And to top it off, for every $1 spent on our product, 80% of it went to the manager(s). So technically, $1 dollar became $0.20 wich became $0.04, ect....This model worked because you have hundreds of customers (and they spent more that $1 on our products). There was a reason that are buisiest part of the season was around spring. Thats when tax returns came around. December was often our slowest month, when most people are scraping by.

AbyssalMage wrote:I didn't say they didn't pay a fortune in taxes. I said they don't pay the same % of their net income in taxes.

No, you said, "by time they are finished paying 'taxes' they spent what they would normally spend on a party."

As my previous post illustrates, rich people spend a lot more on taxes than they do on parties.

And purely in terms of income taxes, they pay a larger percentage of their income than poor/middle class people, so you're wrong there too.

AbyssalMage wrote:Rich people don't invest in non-taxable bonds, well any signifigant amount at least. The return is too low. They do invest in other funds that are more risky but have a better return. And the bonus of these investments are that if they fail, its a tax write off. If they succeed, they don't pay any tax on the return investment until they withdraw the money. The trick (and loophole) is withdrawing them in a manner that you don't have to pay taxes on them when you finally withdraw the money. It requires intimate knowledge of tax codes but the deductions to get this money tax free exists. It just requires losing money on something (buisness expense that you would normally lose money on) you would do normally in order to offset the investment you made.

Many rich people in California invest quite a bit in municipal bonds, because considering taxes, the return is amazing for a relatively safe investment. Yields usually match or beat treasury bonds, and you don't pay 45% of income in taxes.

And the "loopholes" you think exist either never existed, or were closed decades ago, during the Reagan-era reforms. For example, you can only offset $3,000 of capital losses against ordinary income and there are limits to using passive losses to offset other income.

I could go on and on about why you're wrong, but the numbers plainly show the bottom line, that rich people pay a fortune in income taxes.

AbyssalMage wrote:And my standard of living is paid for by tax payers because I work for the people(school aid and wife is a teacher). When I worked in the private sector, the people who paid me were not wealthy. They were my (our) customers.

Who paid to build the school?

Who paid to build the road that connects the school to your customers?

Who pays all the guys with guns (and the manufacturers of those guns) to keep the school and the road safe, from domestic and foreign enemies?

The K-12 budget for California alone is about $60 billion. Who do you think pays the overwhelming majority of that?

AbyssalMage wrote:I didn't say they didn't pay a fortune in taxes. I said they don't pay the same % of their net income in taxes.

No, you said, "by time they are finished paying 'taxes' they spent what they would normally spend on a party."

As my previous post illustrates, rich people spend a lot more on taxes than they do on parties.

And purely in terms of income taxes, they pay a larger percentage of their income than poor/middle class people, so you're wrong there too.

AbyssalMage wrote:Rich people don't invest in non-taxable bonds, well any signifigant amount at least. The return is too low. They do invest in other funds that are more risky but have a better return. And the bonus of these investments are that if they fail, its a tax write off. If they succeed, they don't pay any tax on the return investment until they withdraw the money. The trick (and loophole) is withdrawing them in a manner that you don't have to pay taxes on them when you finally withdraw the money. It requires intimate knowledge of tax codes but the deductions to get this money tax free exists. It just requires losing money on something (buisness expense that you would normally lose money on) you would do normally in order to offset the investment you made.

Many rich people in California invest quite a bit in municipal bonds, because considering taxes, the return is amazing for a relatively safe investment. Yields usually match or beat treasury bonds, and you don't pay 45% of income in taxes.

And the "loopholes" you think exist either never existed, or were closed decades ago, during the Reagan-era reforms. For example, you can only offset $3,000 of capital losses against ordinary income and there are limits to using passive losses to offset other income.

I could go on and on about why you're wrong, but the numbers plainly show the bottom line, that rich people pay a fortune in income taxes.

AbyssalMage wrote:And my standard of living is paid for by tax payers because I work for the people(school aid and wife is a teacher). When I worked in the private sector, the people who paid me were not wealthy. They were my (our) customers.

Who paid to build the school?

Who paid to build the road that connects the school to your customers?

Who pays all the guys with guns (and the manufacturers of those guns) to keep the school and the road safe, from domestic and foreign enemies?

The K-12 budget for California alone is about $60 billion. Who do you think pays the overwhelming majority of that?

Rich people.

You can go on all you want. Doesn't make you correct.

Who paid to build the road that connects the school to your customers? That would be tax payers. The ones who had factory jobs during the 30's and 40's. With the exception of early America and the Rail Roads, Middle and Lower class Americans have always paid for these contructions with Bonds

Who pays all the guys with guns (and the manufacturers of those guns) to keep the school and the road safe, from domestic and foreign enemies? The manufactures for guns get paid by their customers. They are a private buisness. You should know this. Mabye it was late for you when you posted. The people who pay for cops are funded by local taxes, and usually by property owners and/or sales tax. State police...ditto. Homeland Security, CIA, FBI are all funded by Federal Taxes.

The K-12 budget for California alone is about $60 billion. Who do you think pays the overwhelming majority of that?I don't live in California, but assuming your tax structure is the common Republican structure, the Property owners, local taxes, and the lottery. And considering that most people who play the lottery are those in poverty. 3.5 billion from the lottery in 2005/2006. (http://ezinearticles.com/?California-Lo ... id=5323889). Considering that their are more property owners who make less than 250k, I would say the middle class. I would say the rich support education, but most likely at the University level and private school level for k-12.

And the "loopholes" you think exist either never existed, or were closed decades ago, during the Reagan-era reforms. For example, you can only offset $3,000 of capital losses against ordinary income and there are limits to using passive losses to offset other income.Well, actually the tax loop holes still exist. When I got hired they had a nice retirement specialist talk to us. Guess what one of the things they talked about. Investing money in tax free buisnesses that you can then claim for tax losses if they fail. They still exist and mabye in California they closed/capped this loop-hole. But I would wager that if you are a buisness that makes 250k+ you have options. BTW, these loop holes were created by Reagan to promote small buisnesses. Considering that most buisnesses have a 50%+ fail rate, and you only make money when they suceed. You can figure out the amount of money you have to invest to get a sizable return. Unless you got lucky with Google (or similary start up company), it will take many years to see any kind of profit if you see any profit at all. But if you have money to throw away, with no risk or losing it thanks to tax write-offs, its a solid investment (You were going to lose it to the Government otherwise)

Federal, state and local income taxes consumed 9.2% of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950, the Bureau of Economic Analysis reports. That rate is far below the historic average of 12% for the last half-century. The overall tax burden hit bottom in December at 8.8.% of income before rising slightly in the first three months of 2010.

"The idea that taxes are high right now is pretty much nuts," says Michael Ettlinger, head of economic policy at the liberal Center for American Progress.

taxpayers with incomes over $1 million faced a top rate of 94 percent.

The Reagan Tax Cut

The Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981, which enjoyed strong bi-partisan support in the Congress, represented a fundamental shift in the course of federal income tax policy. Championed in principle for many years by then-Congressman Jack Kemp (R-NY) and then-Senator Bill Roth (R- DE), it featured a 25 percent reduction in individual tax brackets, phased in over 3 years, and indexed for inflation thereafter. This brought the top tax bracket down to 50 percent.